Computer systems are currently in wide use. Many computer systems allow users to access structured data.
For example, applications and other computer programs are often deployed in a wide variety of different computing environments. They often allow a user to access, and interact with, structured data. The data can be structured in a wide variety of different ways. For instance, it can be hierarchically arranged data, data provided in a table, data provided in a list, or data provided in another structured form. The data, itself, can also take a wide variety of different forms. For example, the data can include objects, files, list items, or other types of data. Some examples of applications that provide data in a structured way include spreadsheet applications, word processing applications that generate tables, electronic mail or other messaging applications that illustrate messages either as a list (such as in an inbox), or arranged in conversations (which is an example of hierarchically arranged, structured data). Still other applications that generate structured data include financial applications that provide customer lists, inventory lists, timesheet and expense report data. These are examples of applications only.
When interacting with this type of structured data, users often wish to perform some action on a plurality of different data items, all of which have some type of commonality. For instance, when a user is browsing a folder of images, the user may wish to transfer only the images that were captured on a certain day to another folder. In that case, the creation date of the image is an item of commonality. In addition, when a user is importing images from a camera that simultaneously shoots both raw and JPG file formatted images, it may be that the user only wishes to move either the raw or JPG formatted images to a separate folder. As another example, when working on a table of data in a spreadsheet application, the user may wish to take a set of entries with a similar value (such as all entries in the table with the same product category) and plot them on a chart or pivot table.
Selecting a group of data items represented in a structured way has been relatively time consuming and cumbersome. In addition, as touch-based devices (which often do not have a keyboard) become more common, selecting items of structured data has also become more difficult. The touch gestures that a user can initiate with a touch device (such as a stylus or the user's finger) can be less precise than those provided through a keyboard and/or a point-and-click device (such as a mouse or track ball).
Even so, some touch-based applications have a multi-select mode which the user can enter. This mode allows the user to tap on multiple different objects individually in order to add them to a current group selection. Other touch-based applications allow the user to use a special gesture (such as touch and hold) to add multiple items to a group. Other applications have the user perform a search (such as by using a search box) in order to narrow the data items that are displayed to a desired group, and then use a “select all” option to select all items in the displayed group of data items.
All of these techniques are somewhat slow and cumbersome to use. Some of them require the user to know special commands or gestures, and others add steps to the selection process, which can lead to a less desirable user experience.
The discussion above is merely provided for general background information and is not intended to be used as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter.